


nothing gold can stay

by andchaos



Category: A.P. Bio (TV), The Mick (TV)
Genre: Crossover, F/F, First Meetings, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-30
Updated: 2018-03-30
Packaged: 2019-04-15 03:47:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14151252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andchaos/pseuds/andchaos
Summary: Sarika had kind of thought that the National Model U.N. Conference would be a little more...serious. But maybe that’s something she could use a little less of in her life, anyway. If not-so-serious looks anything like Sabrina, she could get used to the feeling.





	nothing gold can stay

**Author's Note:**

> title from a robert frost poem  
> [catch me being gay on main @ lesbianfreyja](http://lesbianfreyja.tumblr.com/post/172423716980)
> 
>  
> 
> dedicated to queen aparna herself, who requested more sarika fic. you meant you wanted it to be gay, right? you wanted gay shit?

Sarika had kind of thought that the National Model U.N. Conference would be a little more…serious.

The debating, she liked very much. Seeing New York was almost as good; they got to tour the streets around the hotel during the day, and then come back to the room to study and work on their arguments during the afternoon. They ate with their own schools, but she saw other students around at their nearby tables. It was kind of strange, deciding if she wanted to be pleasant or cold to them, friendly stranger or fierce competitor. Most of the time, she decided to just reopen her notebook and keep working at her debate points.

But now the debating and sightseeing is over, and she’s here, at the door of what she hoped would be a classy wine and cheese type of event, but instead is…this.

“Holy shit, Sarika!” One of her classmates stumbles over to her; she squints at them. “You _have_ to check out the buffet table. And have you seen these out of state guys? Why don’t they make them like that in Toledo?”

“Are you drunk?” Sarika asks, leaning away. “Where the hell did you get alcohol from, anyway?”

“One of the Connecticut girls has a fake and snuck us in nips and a couple of flasks in the pockets of her dress,” says the other girl. She turns and points at a dark-haired girl in the crowd, who, as though by some kind of sixth sense, turns and looks at them at just that moment. Sarika flushes and waves; the girl gives her a tiny smile back, although by the time Sarika turns back to her classmate, she’s beginning to think that it was more of a smirk.

“That’s against the rules,” Sarika says severely.

The girl scoffs. “Lighten up, Sarkar. The debating is over, it’s time to have fun.”

“I just don’t think—”

“Ugh, _whatever_ ,” she says, and she wanders back into the crowd.

Sarika sighs. She casts her eyes around for something nearby to slouch on, and settles for a table that isn’t being occupied with boys stuffing their faces or couples already making out on the chairs. _That_ particular high school stereotype happens to be true, unfortunately.

There’s bowls of M&Ms left out on the table for them. Sarika picks absently at it, wondering if she should just call it a night and go back to the room. There has to be something on Netflix that’s better than this.

She glances at the door that leads up to the hotel and wonders if anyone will even notice if she slips out right now. It’s kind of depressing that she doesn’t think anyone will. She goes back to the M&Ms.

“You know, I think you’re the only one here who looks like she isn’t having any fun.”

Sarika looks up. The Connecticut girl from earlier is standing over her, hands on her hips, a look somewhere between condescending and genuinely sorry on her face.

Sarika pulls out the chair next to her. The girl drops down onto it, smoothing out her dress over her thighs. They don’t reach past her knees; the girl is smirking again when Sarika looks back up at her face.

“I was just…not expecting this,” Sarika says, waving her hand around at the room in general.

“Don’t party much, huh?” says the other girl.

“Yeah. You must though, right? They say you’re the girl to find if you want a little, uh, extracurricular activity.”

The girl smiles then, brightly, not like before. She reaches into one of the many folds in her dress and pulls out a nip of Jack Daniels. “You want a taste?”

“No, thank you,” says Sarika. The girl shrugs and unscrews the cap, and throws it back herself. She doesn’t even flinch when it hits her throat, just downs it and wipes the back of her hand across her mouth. Sarika squints at her. “I’m guessing this is _exactly_ your speed, then?”

“No, not really,” she says, screwing the cap back on it and tossing the empty bottle cleanly over the table and into the garbage can up against the wall on the other side. It lands in perfectly, no rim. “I’m used to stuff a little more wild than this, you know? I figured some alcohol would make these squares a little more fun, but it just made them sloppy.”

Sarika glances at a door leading to fresh air, and the boy bent over the threshold looking sick.

“I’m Sabrina, by the way,” says the girl, reaching her hand out to shake. “Sabrina Pemberton.”

“Sarika Sarkar,” she returns, clasping hands and shaking firmly. “I’m from the school from Toledo.”

“We’re from Connecticut,” says Sabrina. “Greenwich. Congratulations on placing third, by the way.”

“Thanks,” Sarika says. “Sorry the judge cut you off. You were totally on a roll about the legislature thing.”

Sabrina nods vaguely.

“Yeah, but I was over the time limit.” She says it like it’s no big deal. “You know, at first I didn’t even think Model U.N. would be fun. I just did it because my guidance counselor said it would look good on my college apps. But I actually really like debating – my aunt says I’m great at arguing.”

Sarika smiles. “She must be right, if you made it out here.”

Sabrina shrugs. “I guess the city is some big, crazy concept for people not from around here. This is just like, a weekend trip for me. Like going one town over.”

“That must be nice.”

She shrugs again. “I guess. What about you? What’s Toledo like?”

Sarika sighs. “What’s any small town like? The teachers are stupid, the kids are boring, and everyone knows everyone’s business. I like my school, don’t get me wrong. I just want…more.”

Sabrina nods. “That sounds terrible.”

“Like I said, I like it,” she says.

Sabrina shudders. “I would just hate that, everybody knowing all my business all the time? How do you get away with anything?”

Sarika shrugs. “You don’t. We even know what our teachers are up to. It’s kind of weird.”

“Well, you’ll get to go anywhere else that you want as soon as you graduate. Just a couple of months. Where are you looking to go to college?”

“Yale,” says Sarika. She smiles suddenly. “Hey, that’s in Connecticut. I’ll be right nearby.”

Sabrina laughs. “Yeah, you will be.”

Sarika watches the smile fade from her face. Sabrina fixes her dress again. Sarika looks at her knees.

“Hey, do you want to go dance?” asks Sabrina, jerking her thumb over her shoulder. “I know you said you don’t really like these things, but it could be fun.”

Sarika looks out at the dance floor, at the sober people too awkward to really get into the music, and the drunk kids getting way too crazy. She looks back at Sabrina, and the little smile on her face.

“I’m not sure,” Sarika says uncertainly. “They don’t look like they’ll be wanting pictures of any of this.”

Sabrina rolls her eyes. “Come on. It’s fun. The school part is over, don’t you want to have some fun? Who cares what it looks like to other people?”

Sarika bites her lip, looking out at the crowd again, then back at Sabrina arching her eyebrows expectantly at her. She somehow looks simultaneously like a precocious child and a beautiful temptress, both used to getting what they want, both of which leave Sarika virtually powerless to say no.

“Yeah, why not?” she says at last.

Sabrina lightens and gets up. She reaches her hand out, and Sarika takes it and lets her pull her up and out onto the main floor, where the tables have all been cleared away.

Sabrina isn’t like the drunk or the sober kids. She seems totally aware, totally in control, but she doesn’t seem to really care what everyone else is doing either. She dances with her arms over her head, shaking and winding her hips like this isn’t the first time she’s using them to get exactly what she wants. Sarika wonders just what it is that she wants this time, and why it feels sort of like she’s already given it to her.

When she wraps her arms around Sarika’s neck and tugs at her, Sarika laughs and trips closer, and settles her hands on Sabrina’s waist.

“Is this more like how you like to party?” Sabrina asks.

Sarika breathes out unsteadily. “I wouldn’t know,” she says. “I’ve never partied before.”

“Well, it’s a good thing you met me then.”

Sarika leans her face in closer. She just wants to. Maybe that’s an infectious thing, following her instincts.

“Yeah, it is,” she says. “It’s a very good thing. I wouldn’t want my first time to be something else.”

Sabrina giggles. Sarika blushes dark red and leans away, her fingers scrunching on the sides of Sabrina’s dress.

“That came out weird,” she says. “I’m so sorry, that isn’t what I meant.”

Sabrina’s still laughing, but she cards one of her hands through Sarika’s hair, and nicks her thumb against her chin.

“It’s okay, it’s cute,” she says.

For some reason, Sarika can’t stop looking at her lips. Sabrina is smiling.

“Have you ever kissed a girl before?” she asks, out of nowhere.

Sarika jumps a little. She glances at Sabrina’s lips again, then shrugs and looks at the floor.

“No.”

“But you want to?” Sabrina’s voice coaxes Sarika to look back at her.

“I don’t know,” Sarika says, although it weirdly feels like a lie. “I don’t kiss people I just met.”

Sabrina smiles. “But you want to?” she repeats.

Sarika swallows. Sabrina is almost shimmering in the flashing lights from the plastic disco ball they have strung up to the ceiling, and it makes her look like her edges are shimmering.

“Yes,” Sarika breathes.

“Kiss me then,” says Sabrina.

Sarika blinks at her. “What?”

“I mean it,” says Sabrina. “If you want something, Sarika, there’s no reason you shouldn’t have it.”

Sarika laughs. “I can find plenty of flaws in that argument already. No wonder Connecticut didn’t win.”

Sabrina hits her playfully on the arm, grinning.

“I’m being serious,” she says. “If you want to kiss me, then you should. When you want something, you have to just take it. Nobody’s going to give you anything. Not an offer or a free pass or permission.”

“I know that,” she says. “Please. I’m a brown teenager from a state that borders Kentucky – I _know_. I’m just not used to doing things like…this.”

“Life’s not just about getting ahead,” says Sabrina, rolling her eyes. “Nothing’s stopping you from just doing whatever you want, whenever you want.”

“Except school, my parents, my grades—”

“That’s not what I mean.” Sabrina laughs and shifts her body closer. Sarika’s breath catches somewhere in the region of her throat. “If you want to do something, just…do it.”

Sarika sighs. She looks at Sabrina, and Sabrina looks back.

“Just do it,” Sabrina whispers, again.

Sarika takes her hand off of Sabrina’s waist. She presses her palm against Sabrina’s cheek, and Sabrina leans into it. Her eyes are wide and open and looking at Sarika in a way like she really can have whatever she feels like, if she just reaches out and takes it.

Sarika leans across the distance between them and kisses her, once. When she starts to pull away, Sabrina’s arms tighten around her neck and she changes her mind and goes back in instead, pressing her body up against Sabrina’s, feeling herself warm everywhere they touch.

They stay like that for a beat, two. The band playing on the speaker finishes another line.

Sarika pulls away first. She can feel the touch of Sabrina’s lips on her own like a quiet pressure – she touches the tips of her fingers to her mouth to make sure they aren’t still kissing, but the sensation doesn’t go away.

“How was that?” Sabrina asks. “Just taking what you want and running with it?”

Sarika nods, senselessly.

“I think you might be onto something,” she says. She can’t take her eyes off of Sabrina’s lips.

“I’m not sure you’re convinced just yet,” says Sabrina. Strange how she’s still wearing that smirk, and it doesn’t irritate Sarika the way that face usually does on someone else.

Sabrina reaches out for her and kisses her again, for longer this time; then the song changes, and they pull away and slow down with the music. Sabrina rests her head on Sarika’s shoulder, and Sarika wraps her arms around her. They sway.

New York staff is weird, too. At any of her usual high school dances, they would have been pulled apart already and told to leave room for the Holy Spirit. Sarika thinks she likes this much better. Sabrina’s hair smells like peaches and she’s very warm and soft. The taste of her, underlain with the Jack Daniels she drank, is still on Sarika’s tongue.

“I’m not usually like this, you know,” Sarika says. She doesn’t know what makes her say it. “I don’t go around kissing people I’ve just met.”

Sabrina turns her head to look up at her, but she doesn’t take her cheek off of Sarika’s shoulder.

“I do,” she says simply. “Either way, I’m glad you decided to break _some_ rules tonight.”

Sarika tightens her arms around Sabrina. “Me too. Why are all the good girls from out of state?”

Sabrina finally lifts her head away from Sarika’s shoulder, only to grin at her, their faces close and the smile a little dangerous.

“I’m not a good girl,” Sabrina says.

Sarika rolls her eyes. “You _know_ what I meant.”

“Yeah, but I think we should get back to what _I_ meant.”

Sarika laughs, shaking her head. She realizes they’re still slow dancing even though the song has ended and gone back to something more upbeat.

“Okay. What makes you not a good girl?”

“Hmm.” Sabrina traces a finger across Sarika’s collarbone, and she shivers. “I lie. I fight with my aunt and my brothers. I use my fake I.D. to sneak liquor into Model U.N. conferences…”

Something about the tone of her voice is making Sarika feel lightheaded and warm, even though she fundamentally dislikes the things she’s saying.

“Uh-huh,” she says, her eyes trained on Sabrina’s. “What else?”

“I get high with my ex-maid.” She leans her face closer, drops her voice lower. “I seduce girls I don’t know.”

Sarika quirks an eyebrow. “What makes you think _I’m_ not the one seducing _you_?”

Sabrina nods. Her face is close enough that Sarika could count the strands of hair framing her jaw. “I like that, too.”

One of them, she isn’t sure who, leans in the last inch and kisses the other again. Sabrina blinks at her after and asks, “Do you want to go for a walk?”

“Very much,” says Sarika.

They have to pass the boy still bent over the threshold to get outside, but the fresh air is immediately both bracing and deeply refreshingly. Sarika takes gulps of it; she didn’t realize how suffocated she felt inside until she was released from it.

They can’t go far from the door, just around the little fenced-in grassy area about the same size as the room they just came from. Sabrina absently catches her hand as they walk. They go around the edge of the lawn, away from the kids smoking cigarettes and looking at the stars.

“What do you want to major in at Yale?” Sabrina asks.

“I’m not sure yet,” Sarika says. “I’m focusing on getting there first. Maybe something to do with poli-sci. What about you? Where do you want to go?”

“Oh, I’m going to NYU and I’m going to do environmentalism so I can be an activist after.”

“Wow. You already know all that?”

Sabrina shrugs. “Plus, the loft parties in Soho are fantastic.”

Sarika gives a startled laugh. “I’ll take your word for it.”

“Wow, parties really aren’t your thing, are they?” Sabrina asks, eyes searching her face. She looks more serious now, not teasing like before. Sarika shakes her head. “So what _do_ you do in your spare time?”

“I can play the piano,” Sarika offers, after a pause.

“Seriously? That’s so cool.”

“I’ve been playing since I was seven,” says Sarika. “I just felt like learning it. I don’t go to classes anymore, but I do recitals sometimes. Usually I just play for my cat. He likes to lay on the chair next to me and listen.”

“That is so sweet,” says Sabrina, one hand over her heart. “You should play me something sometime.”

“I will,” says Sarika. “What about you? Any hidden talents you haven’t told me about yet?”

“I used to write poetry,” she says.

“Why did you stop?”

“My teacher was a creep. It was a whole thing, turns out I don’t really have a knack for it.”

“I’m sure you’re great,” says Sarika, nudging her with her shoulder. “You just have to do it. There’s no real way to learn except practice.”

“Maybe,” says Sabrina. Sarika has the feeling she isn’t agreeing so much as just trying to drop the subject. “Oh, look. The fountain is on.”

Sarika snorts. “That’s too romantic. Should we go sit down?”

“Obviously.”

The fountain in question is set at the very edge of the lawn. It isn’t lit up, but it’s medium-sized and they can sit on the edge and run their fingers through the water. Sabrina splashes her, and she doesn’t do it back but she laughs.

“You look pretty in the moonlight,” Sabrina says, reaching out to run her wet fingers through Sarika’s hair. In her periphery, Sarika can sort of see how it shines. It’s probably just the water.

“Thanks,” she says, cheeks heating. She knows she should probably say it back, but the flirting thing feels weird and new and awkward, and she doesn’t. “Can I ask you something?”

Sabrina shifts a little closer to her. “Of course.”

“How do you do it?” Sarika asks. “How do you just…not care?”

“What do you mean?” She tilts her head to the side, and somehow it makes her look even more beautiful.

“I just,” Sarika sighs, watching her hands twisting on her lap, “Everything seems so easy for you. My mom always wants me to have more fun. Even my teachers think I work too hard. How do you let loose and still have time for all your extracurriculars? For this, _and_ for partying, _and_ for figuring out how to date girls?”

Sabrina laughs, not meanly, and it sounds a little something like bells chiming in the distance.

“Is that what you’re worried about?” she asks, squinting at her. “Sarika, dating girls is just like dating boys.”

Sarika just looks at her. Sabrina sighs.

“Look. I really don’t have everything figured out. Shit, I don’t have _anything_ figured out. I’ve fucked up every relationship I’ve been in for the past couple of years, and I find myself taking advice from my aunt’s weird boyfriend way more than I’m comfortable with lately.” She sighs. “So the letting loose thing…You just have to have _fun_. I know you know how. Like tonight, with me – that was fun, wasn’t it?”

“Of course it was. It is.”

“Right. Look, you’re smart – I heard how you debated up there yesterday. You don’t have to try so hard, you already _get it_. Make yourself some free time and just do what you want to do.”

Sarika shakes her head. “That’s going to take some getting used to.”

“I think you’re more of a natural at it than you think,” Sabrina says. She covers Sarika’s hand with her own where it’s laying on the edge of the fountain, and Sarika turns her palm up and squeezes her hand. She smiles softly at her, and Sabrina bites her lip and gives her the same look right back.

“I still have some Jack Daniels left if you really want to loosen up,” she says after a moment, and Sarika laughs.

“No, really, that’s okay,” she says. Sabrina looks at her, brow furrowed, and Sarika laughs. “It’s not that I don’t drink – there’s just absolutely no way I’m throwing back nips of whiskey without a chaser nearby. Do you want me to throw up in the bushes?”

“That’s certainly a side of you that I wouldn’t expect to see.”

“And you’re never _going_ to see it,” Sarika laughs, shaking her head. “Now come on, do you want to waste the one night we have making fun of me or do you want to actually do something with it?”

“What did you have in mind?” Sabrina asks, leaning in toward her so that Sarika can smell her perfume again, peaches and whiskey, as it wafts forward on the air.

Sarika smiles.

“Oh, you know,” she says, tossing her free hand in the air, her hair flying over her shoulder. “Recite Olde English poetry to each other, talk about our favorite Renaissance artists, argue about who we like best on Top Chef –”

“Shut up and come here,” Sabrina laughs, pulling on Sarika’s shoulder until she sways toward her and she can capture her mouth again.

It’s a slow, steady kiss that goes on for awhile. It never goes farther than that, and it spreads through Sarika like honey, heated and sweet and heady as it arches through her blood. She can taste the stars on Sabrina’s lips, can feel the galaxy beginning in her chest. It’s a warm explosion.

They pull apart after awhile, like a bell has gone off somewhere telling them it’s almost midnight, and the ball is over. They look at each other, quiet, blinking slowly back to reality. Sabrina reaches out to tuck some of Sarika’s hair behind her ear.

“Come on,” Sarika says, softer than the breeze. “We should go home. Early morning, right?”

Sabrina says nothing. She nods.

They get up and go back across the lawn, through the dance which is still in half-swing, and out, up the stairs and into the hotel lobby, then into the elevator.

They get to Sabrina’s floor, then just outside her door. Sarika pauses with her, and they look at each other in the dim hotel lighting.

“Come back to my room with me,” Sabrina says, tugging on her hand. She must notice the alarmed look on Sarika’s face, because she adds, “Not to do anything, just to hang out some more. The other kids won’t care.”

“I can’t,” she says, but she wants to. A tug behind her navel urges her forward. She resists. “I’m supposed to be back at the room by midnight. It’s almost five ‘til.”

“And you don’t break those rules either, I’m guessing,” Sabrina sighs, more of a statement of fact than a question.

Still, Sarika shakes her head. “I would invite you back to mine, but our chaperones are really strict.

Sabrina frowns. “But that means I won’t get to see you again. We’re leaving in the morning.”

Sarika shrugs. “I guess not.”

“Sarika…”

“We had fun though, right?” she says, reaching out again for her hand and squeezing. “And we can still text, you have my number. Hey, if you’re ever in Toledo…”

Sabrina smiles. “Yeah, next time I’m touring Ohio I’ll look you up.”

They share a small smile. Then Sabrina frowns again, and Sarika steps up to her and cradles her cheek in one hand and kisses her, gently. Sabrina leans into it, and then away.

“’Bye, Sarika Sarkar,” she says.

Sarika steps away. She raises her hand in farewell.

“Goodbye, Sabrina Pemberton.”

She hesitates, then turns around. She doesn’t look back, but she doesn’t hear Sabrina move, either, as she walks down the hall and away from her.

Maybe she was wrong earlier. The National Model U.N. Conference isn’t so serious, but maybe that’s something she could use a little less of in her life, anyway. If not-so-serious looks anything like Sabrina, she could get used to the feeling.


End file.
